How To

In four steps, you can launch a Tutor/Mentor Connection Strategy to construct vital information systems that aid volunteer networks and enliven school to career pathways. This successful model transforms the lives of urban youth, their loved ones and future generations. Daniel, a respected State of Illinois leader, explains how in this article.

A key part of information gathering is maps that show census data and other indicators showing where youth and families need extra help. Two examples are shown left and at the top of this article. (Attribution: Mapping For Justice).

Is there a need for a Tutor/Mentor Connection type intermediary focused on combating poverty and inequality in Cleveland and Cincinnati, and other Ohio cities? By Daniel F. Bassill, President, Tutor/Mentor Institute and Advisory Director, I-Open

I'm in Chicago, but have been guest blogging on the I-Open platform for about a year, after several years of developing a shared vision with Betsey Merkel, one of the Co-Founders of I-Open.

I-Open's home base is in Cleveland, Ohio USA and my goal of writing these articles has been to help I-Open, or others, form a team that would duplicate the Tutor/Mentor Connection* strategy, which I've piloted successfully in Chicago since 1993.

This model can be easily replicated and customized for your neighborhood if you live in Cleveland, Cincinnati or any other large Ohio city by combining what we know at the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC and what collaborating Ohio educational consultants and volunteers from the I-Open network may know.

So, let's start with a few questions to see if there is a need.

Who hosts a web library with information people in Cleveland could use to understand the many roots of poverty?

Does this library focus on neighborhoods where poverty concentrations are highest?

Does the library identify and support existing organizations that already are doing needed work?

Note: Remember that as you do your research to answer these questions, build a blog or web site to host and share what you are learning!

The FOUR-PART TUTOR/MENTOR CONNECTION STRATEGY

﻿Step One: Build Network Brainpower

Editor's Note: Every strategic investment in Open Source Economic Development starts with connecting to our most competitive advantage, Brainpower (see: The Innovation Framework). The Tutor/Mentor strategy recommends doing just that by identifying existing sources of research investment and connecting them online for mutual benefit and scalability.

Tutor/Mentor Connection Strategy: Step One

Collect And Share Quality Information
Click on the map (right) to open the link and browse the four sections of the T/MC library and see the wide range of information it contains. Much can already be used by leaders in Ohio cities, but key parts, such as a list of Chicago non-school tutor/mentor programs, focuses on Chicago, meaning someone needs to be aggregating similar data that is specific to Cleveland, Cincinnati and other cities.

﻿A key part of this library would be maps that show census data and other indicators showing where youth and families need extra help. Two examples are shown left and at the top of this article. (Attribution: Mapping For Justice.)﻿

Much of the information that needs to be collected is “market based” information.

Questions To Ask:

Who are the organizations working in different parts of a city to help reduce poverty or provide greater opportunity?

Where are they located, what do they do? Who do they serve?

How well do they show what they do on their web sites?

What are the challenges they face?

How can intermediaries and others help them overcome those challenges, so each organization is constantly improving it's impact?

What leaders in business, faith groups, colleges, politics, or among nonprofit organizations, have adopted this commitment, and show a visualization like this on their web sites, to indicate their support?

Is anyone using concept maps, wikis and/or web platforms to aggregate this information or create a navigation path so information that is known to a few people can be found and used by anyone interested in helping combat poverty and inequality in these cities?

Unless this information is collected, and plotted on maps, the basic information needed to invite people to connect to build a larger network of leaders and support a collective effort, is missing. This strategy seeks to influence resource providers, not just service providers.

I'm sure part of this information is hosted by various organizations, universities and city government agencies.

So, again: Who is using concept maps, wikis and/or web platforms to aggregate this information or create a navigation path so information that is known to a few people can be found and used by anyone interested in helping combat poverty and inequality in these cities?﻿

Step Two: Invest in Innovation and Entrepreneurial Networks

Editor's Note: To translate Brainpower, every initiative must invest in the construction of Innovation and Entrepreneurial Networks (see The Innovation Framework).

These are relationship-based communication pathways, online and face-to-face, that translate and direct knowledge resources to those who seek them.

Tutor/Mentor Connection Strategy: Step Two

Connect And Collaborate To Amplify The Call To Action
I come from a retail advertising background where we spent millions of dollars every year to draw customers to more than 400 stores located in 40 states. I've never had much money, but I've constantly looked for ways to draw attention more frequently to all of the information in the Tutor/Mentor Connection web library, including the list of programs that I've maintained since 1993 (Read the Virtual Corporate Office PDF at http://tinyurl.com/TMI-VirtualCorpOffice ). By creating web based libraries like the Tutor/Mentor Institute's, many can take intermediary roles designed to draw more attention and resources into high poverty neighborhoods, not just the people leading organizations in these neighborhoods.

Here's one way to do that:

The map above is one of many map stories I've generated since the mid 1990's.

This story follows a high visibility story in the local newspaper with a map showing where the story took place, and showing the need for tutor/mentor programs in that area.

It ends with a “call for involvement” supporting the growth of programs in that area, or in other areas of the city with similar levels of poverty.

I've created hundreds of maps like this since 1993 and have been sharing them on blogs since 2005. Imagine how much more impact we'd create if hundreds of people were creating similar map stories.

Here's another way to grow attention:

﻿The image above points to a year-round schedule of events that could be duplicated in any city. Such events are part of quarterly events that repeat year after year. While these bring stakeholders together to network, learn and share ideas, they are also intended to generate media stories or social media attention that increases the number of people who view the information in the T/MC web library, and draw volunteers and donors directly to neighborhood tutoring and/or mentoring programs, on a regular basis. ﻿

﻿FOCUS ON THIS: It's this commitment to try to help local organizations get the operating resources each needs that makes this strategy unique. We're not just providing training and technical assistance and raising money for our own operations. We're trying to provide the advertising and talent development that draws volunteers and operating dollars to every high poverty neighborhood of the city on a more consistent basis.

Is anyone in Ohio cities creating map stories, like these, with a goal of drawing attention and resources to existing organizations already operating in different neighborhoods of Ohio cities? Is anyone trying to teach young people in high schools, colleges and/or youth serving organizations to create such stories using existing data?

Build a list of web sites where this is happening. That's a start. ﻿

Step Three: Construct Quality, Connected Destinations

Editor's Note: By developing "hubs" or "nodes" led by people, firms or online web properties to organize and connect the Innovation and Entrepreneurial Networks (referenced above), the facilitation and redistribution of knowledge gathered in Steps One and Two becomes effective and scalable.

Manage And Leverage Information For Collective Usefulness

We need to develop a network of information facilitators, trainers and coaches who help people find information in the library, understand it, then learn how they can apply it personally, or through their business, college, social group, faith group, or political leadership.

﻿I-Open takes on this role by sharing my articles on their blogs and by marketing the articles across I-Open social media accounts. Many more people need to do this, to amplify the ideas of intermediaries taking on a T/MC role in Ohio cities.

The Internet has made an unlimited amount of information available, but we've not found a way to put more hours into each day, so people could read and reflect more often. However, there are ways to overcome this.﻿

Consider, for example, that in Chicago, Interns from various universities have spent time looking at the ideas and information in the Tutor/Mentor library.

Then they have written blog articles and created a variety of visualizations and videos that share their understanding with others.

I think this strategy could be duplicated in many places. There could be a college-based T/MC team based at any number of the many Ohio universities (see pdf at http://tinyurl.com/startTMCatCollege ).

Similar teams could form in high schools, faith groups and non-school, site-based tutoring/mentoring programs, with business volunteers serving as coaches and mentors.

﻿﻿Step Four: The Regional "Win-Win"﻿﻿

﻿Editor's Note:By investing in a human centered, technology-based approach to re-invest in youth school to career pathways, every neighborhood and it's private and public institutions have the opportunity to win. Getting started with the Tutor/Mentor Connection Strategy to unleash the power of information regardless of social or geographic boundaries is how communities and their regions can share resources and be prepared to grasp the new opportunities before them.﻿

Collective Participation Grows All Existing Organizations
The goal of

better information (Step 1)

more people looking at the information (Step 2) and

more people understanding how to apply the information (Step 3)

is that more people are learning to support the on-going

operations and constant improvement of organizations THAT ALREADY EXIST in different neighborhoods, or to help fill voids, where new or expanded services are needed, in underserved neighborhoods of Cleveland, Cincinnati and other Ohio cities.

If enough people take this role and needed resources flow more consistently into every poverty neighborhood, we begin to strengthen...and sustain... the human capital needed at the ground level, in every neighborhood, which enables people working in these organizations to be constantly learning ways to improve, share what they do with others, and constantly improve the impact of work that helps close gaps between rich and poor by providing more tools and economic mobility to people living in every high poverty neighborhood of a city, not just a few of those neighborhoods.

Tutor/Mentor Institute Strategy Pyramid Results Map

This is an on-going process. We all want the same outcomes, but we need more people doing the work that enables this to happen, and that provides support in all areas of a city on a more consistent basis, not just a few neighborhoods for short periods of time.

So back to my first question. Is someone already leading this process in Cleveland, Cincinnati, or other Ohio cities?

Go through Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC web sites, with this check list (left), and check off your research findings.

This makes an excellent research project for students from local high schools or colleges.

If no one is taking the T/MC role in your city, let myself and a team of I-Open consultants help you build and sustain this structure to guarantee access to information by anyone, build a neighborhood's Brainpower, and accelerate a successful path from high school to career for all residents.

Investigative Inquiry Questions:

____ We already do that

____ We do it better than T/MC

____ or, We CAN do it, and do it better!

____ And, we share what we are doing, in the same ways T/MC does, so others can learn from us.

It would be great to see many people writing articles showing their own perspective on the strategy I've offered and how information-based problem solving fits into their own philosophy and areas of interest. Please add your story in the comments section below!

* Throughout this and other articles I use Tutor/Mentor Connection (T/MC) and Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC interchangeably. The T/MC was created in 1993 as part of a non profit structure and I led it under that structure until 2011 when the non profit host decided to no longer support the strategy, I created Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC in 2011 to continue to support the T/MC in Chicago and to help similar intermediaries grow in other cities.

Daniel is sought by organizations striving to do what he has done for over 36 years: lead comprehensive, volunteer-based, non-school tutoring and mentoring programs serving inner-city children and youth. Follow @TutorMentorTeam and Learn More Here.

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Last week the Community-Wealth.org newsletter included a White Paper focusing on role of hospitals as anchor organizations and used Cleveland as one of it's examples. I used an annotation tool to add my comments to the PDF. You can see this in my blog at http://tutormentor.blogspot.com/2015/12/can-hospitals-heal-americas-communities.html

As leaders in cities review the strategies they have in place, using the article I shared on the I-Open blog in September, they would be digging into White Papers like this the same way I've done, and they would be drawing other stakeholders into the article with them.

Today on my Facebook feed I found this article under the heading "Cleveland most segregated city in America" - http://cleveland.suntimes.com/cle-news/7/91/298064/counties-household-income-risen-ohio/ There's quite a bit of data in this article that planing teams in the area could use along with the ideas I've shared in my own article.